Tell Tale Quilt Process
Here is the technical documentation for the Tell Tale Quilt project:
DESCRIPTION
We use quilts to memorialize histories and tell stories, to protect us and comfort us. But quilts also lay silently, storing our memories. They know how we sleep, when we get cold, when we cry into them, when we need protection, how many bodies are under or on top of them. What if your quilt could speak? What stories would it share? What would it remember? What would it forget? What happens when the Quilt is the one telling your story?
The Tell Tale Quilt is a quilt that shares intimate, but non-identifiable data about its owner with anyone who wants to listen. It is an array of eight patches, each containing an embroidered fabric speaker constructed from conductive thread and magnets. Opening a patch activates the speaker, recounting one memory stored by the Quilt.
A growing number of our everyday devices have the ability to collect, store, and communicate stories about us: your likes, your habits, your movements, your locations, even your emotions. Often we have no choice what is gathered and shared. Woven together, these aggregated data points form a story about you that is valuable for companies, third parties, and governments. But is it you? Is this the story you would choose to tell about yourself? The Tell Tale Quilt imagines a future where the textiles knitted into our lives also have the ability to collect and share information. Will this new layer of intimate details stitch a more complete story of you or further obfuscate it? Perhaps more importantly, which option would we want?
IN ACTION
>MATERIALS
Karl Grimm conductive thread
EeonTex resistive stretch fabric (see distributors tab for more places to purchase)
Stretch conductive fabric
Neodymium magnets
Arduino Mini Pro
DFPlayer Mini
**Note: The library provided is extremely problematic. I highly recommend using this sketch by Ype Brada that uses commands instead of a library as the basis for your program. Here is a simple test sketch that plays the first file to help you get an idea of the command structure. Unfortunately, he original documentation was removed (no idea why) so I will be developing a complete tutorial by the middle of summer 2018.
10 K Ohm resistors x 2
1 K Ohm resistors x 2
3.3 Voltage regulators
Female header pins
CODE
Can be found here. There are the basic DFPlayer Mini tutorials described above and sketches with calibrated sensors.
CIRCUIT
SPEAKER TESTS
The Tell Tale Quilt Test from Liza Stark on Vimeo.
Created during a month-long residency at Laboratory in Spokane, WA.